An Egyptian court has sentenced three Al-Jazeera English journalists to three years in prison. Peter Greste, Mohammed Fahmy and Baher Mohammed were all arrested in December 2013 on terrorism-related charges in a case widely criticized by rights groups.
Here is a look at the biographies of the three:
PETER GRESTE, 49
Australian Greste had barely arrived in Cairo to work as a correspondent when he was arrested along with Fahmy. After freelancing in Britain, he joined the BBC as its Afghanistan correspondent in 1995. The following year he covered Yugoslavia for Reuters before returning to the BBC. Peter spent more than a decade with the British broadcaster, reporting from across Latin America, the Middle East and Africa before joining Al Jazeera in 2011 — the year he won a prestigious Peabody Award for a BBC report on Somalia. Greste’s hometown is Brisbane, Australia. He also holds Latvian citizenship.
MOHAMMED FAHMY, 41
Canadian-Egyptian Fahmy was working as acting bureau chief for Al-Jazeera English in Cairo at the time of his arrest. He previously worked for The New York Times, CNN and the International Committee of the Red Cross, and before the Arab Spring, covered the war in Iraq. Fahmy was born in Kuwait. He graduated from Cairo American College before relocating to Canada with his parents, where he earned degrees from Montreal’s LaSalle College and Vancouver’s City University. He co-authored a photo documentary of Egypt’s Jan. 25th revolt, and was a winner of the Tom Renner Investigative Journalism Award in 2012 for producing a 30-minute special documentary for CNN called “Death in the Desert.” He also wrote a book about the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
BAHER MOHAMMED, 31
Egyptian Baher Mohammed began working as a TV researcher and producer for the Japanese channel Asahi, and covered the 2011 Libyan uprising before joining Al-Jazeera last year as a producer. He has three children and lives in Cairo. His father was at one point the manager of the Muslim Brotherhood’s television channel, named January 25, which was launched after Egypt’s 2011 uprising.
/+++
